During a normal school year, the homecoming dance, parade, and football game would have all already happened. This school year is different.

Most years the band would have spent the few weeks leading up to homecoming practicing for the parade and halftime show. Most years, the football team wouldn’t have to take weeks off from practicing. However, due to the pandemic, this year is unlike most. Student Senate, the student government at City High, would have met in person to discuss, plan, and prepare every aspect of the homecoming dance.

“[Usually the Student Senate] sets up committees to work on various tasks. We choose the date, venue, theme. We pay for and plan decorations, food and drinks, music, and tickets,” Ms. Gibbens, one of the staff sponsors for Student Senate, said.

However, this year, many clubs and organizations at City High have had to make adjustments in order to continue to meet. Platforms like Discord, GroupMe, and Zoom have been used in order to facilitate the meeting of many activities.

“We are meeting over Zoom rather than in person so that’s different,” Gibbens said.

There are different factors that the Student Senate and Iowa City School District considered before deciding on what to do about the dance. Evan McElroy ‘21 is Senior Class Vice President and member of Student Senate.

“The main thing with homecoming is COVID-19 is the fact that as a dance, it basically requires people to be together; especially with the venues we have open there just isn’t enough room,” said McElroy.

Gibbens agreed that finding a venue that could accommodate social distancing would be the most challenging aspect of planning the dance.

“A venue here at the school would not be big enough for students to social distance,” said Gibbens.

With Student Senate, the teachers, the school administration, and the district all in agreement, they were able to come to a decision regarding the dance.

“There isn’t going to be a homecoming dance unfortunately, Student Senate really didn’t have much of a say there but to be honest it wouldn’t have changed the outcome if we did,” McElroy said. “Everyone pretty much agreed that a homecoming dance wouldn’t be safe.”

Even without the dance, there may be some homecoming traditions that take place in less traditional ways.

“Student senate normally has some input in the homecoming parade, but once again it’s a little odd this year,” McElroy said. “I believe we are not doing a homecoming parade this year, but there might be a different version of it since we plan on doing a homecoming court.”

Last week a voting form for the homecoming court was sent out to seniors. First, 28 finalists were selected, then narrowed down to the final 14. The top two of those 14 homecoming royals were selected during spirit week.